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Buena Vista trip was fun, but skiing closer to home would be nice, too

So far this winter, I've cross country skied and skied with pulling dogs attached to me, but I hadn't gone downhill skiing. That changed on President's Day weekend.

My church, First Lutheran, and Trinity Lutheran Church decided to go together to Buena Vista for an overnight ski trip on President's Day weekend. I've been to Buena Vista before, but never stayed overnight. My dad signed me up without hesitation.

We left Sunday afternoon. When my dad and I got to the bus, there were a lot more people than we were expecting boarding. I was lucky to get a seat.

The bus ride was not exactly a lockdown silent trip. I had girls behind me singing "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" and everyone was talking as loudly as possible. Also, Captain America was playing, and a lot of people were focused on that.

Well, I didn't really know anyone on the bus and have never been into superheroes, so the bus ride wasn't that interesting.

Eventually, we pulled up to Buena Vista. After bringing in all of the bags and checking out our rentals, we hit the slopes. The conditions were perfect; it wasn't too cold or warm out, and snow was groomed.

I haven't been downhill skiing in two years, but it only took one trip down the easiest run before I was hitting all the black diamonds.

I'm the type of person who can only handle an easy course once and then can only do the hard blue squares and black diamonds the rest of the day. Buena Vista sports two really good black diamonds and one decent blue square, so I ended up rotating those three over and over again.

I surprisingly didn't get sick of my rotation, but it helped that I rode up the lifts with a lot of different people. Most people I never had met before, and I had a couple of really good conversations. I have to say my best one was with this snowboarder guy a year ahead of me. I got so caught up talking with him I forgot to ask his name.

When it was time to go in, I was pretty disappointed. Night skiing is awesome. However, tomorrow was a whole new day of skiing.

The evening was pretty fun, complete with cheesy camp games and boys using Presidents' Day decorations as Frisbees. The only thing bad that really happened was a 6th grade boy who drank too much Mountain Dew threw up. He really should have thought twice about drinking all that soda, because the girls were not happy with him and were completely grossed out. I didn't think it was that bad, but still, if he knew he was going to throw up, he should at least have gone to the bathroom.

The other tough part of trip was falling asleep. The chateau we were staying in had big windows that let in a lot of light from outside. To block the light, I had to go in between two wooden tables. Despite the darkness issues, I still fell asleep.

The next day we woke up to some windy, snowy slopes. The conditions were so windy that the main chair lift that stretched up to my three favorite runs was closed. Eventually, they opened the extra chairlift they don't use very often. That only led to one of the runs I liked, but if I hiked up a little ways, I could go down the best slope available.

The storm coming caused us to leave early, but we still got back late. This time, there was no singing, but instead a short game of charades and "Facing the Giants," which I really enjoyed watching but cut off right at the high point.

I love downhill skiing, though I wish I didn't have to go to Bemidji to do it. I would love to be able to ski on Detroit Mountain, and I hear that we might be able to have this ski resort soon. For now, I just dream while reading Telluride magazine, hoping that I can ski again.